Medef launches an “economic front”

The bosses are meeting on Monday for their traditional back-to-school meeting: the Rencontre des entrepreneurs de France, the Ref. They are waiting for the appointment of a Prime Minister.

In recent years, the Prime Minister has often been invited to make his return to work in front of the bosses. But this afternoon, at the Parc Longchamp near Paris, it will be Yaël Braun Pivet, the President of the National Assembly and Gérard Larcher, the President of the Senate, who will open the event. “A strong symbol”according to Patrick Martin, who spoke in an interview with Figaro Monday, August 26. A sign, according to him, that “Decisions will mainly be taken in Parliament”. Moreover, the Medef warns that it will allocate more resources to increase its lobbying with deputies.

The employers’ organization also announced that it will create what it calls “an economic front” to define with economists, business leaders, think tanks, a sort of coalition to establish a program in terms of productivity, energy, innovation that will allow the French economy to hold up. Patrick Martin will perhaps detail this economic front to his members, which remains for the moment rather vague and conceptual.

Obviously, the choice of this name is not innocent. Patrick Martin says it clearly: “If the program of La France Insoumise were implemented, it would be unbearable for the country, in the literal sense of the term,” as this program is considered anti-business. For example, raising the minimum wage to 1,600 euros net would bring down entire sectors, such as catering, construction, cleaning, because employers would not be able to keep up, and there would be thousands of layoffs. The Medef also does not want to hear about a review of the pension reform that would further increase our deficits, nor about higher taxes on businesses that would penalize them.

All this in a context of budget preparation. A few days ago, Gabriel Attal, the resigning Prime Minister, sent each ministry the traditional ceiling letters for 2025 and most of them provide for budget cuts. Suffice to say that aid to companies promises to be less generous next year. To sum up, in this tight budgetary context, and in a political situation that is still very uncertain, entrepreneurs fear that the pro-business policy pursued by Emmanuel Macron in recent years is simply over. This is the message they intend to convey today.